Mendham Twp Closer To School Study Decision

The Mendham Township Committee took a step towards a decision on funding the feasibility study on the dissolution of the regional school district last week by moving forward on a planto draft a joint referendum on the topic.

"The point of all this is that residents have, over time, had a strong interest in looking at the school renewal system," committee member Sam Tolley. "We have tried on a number of occasions to work on that over the years, and in the last iteration the residents came to this committee and asked for us to designate money. We did not do that and we have not done that, but we have determined that there would be money available in the budget if necessary for that. We did that because we wanted to know if there was enough interest from the school boards as well as the municipalities that if we do something that we can move forward and actually achieve results. Our thought is to come up with a reasonable plan that makes sense, so if money is spent it would be to a purpose that makes sense and not just another study gathering dust on a shelf."

The plan is to come up with a document that could be circulated to other Mendham and the two Chesters in an attempt to gauge interest so that if the process does move forward there is a noted level of interest in the study.

The committee and the residents, Tolley said, are "interested in two specific things to look at relative to actually removing ourselves from the regional school board."

Tolley also said addressing the issue of educational quality is important to him.

"It's been very important to me that the educational quality has been called into question in the regional school system, I think at times unjustly and unfairly," Tolley said. "We know that the state studies do not take into account the international baccalaureate program, therefore the results that are derived from the studies are fundamentally flawed."

Tolley said those flawed studies were used in a number of different magazine and periodical lists which exacerbated the perception problem.

"We also know that in times past the regional school board did not properly spend money on both school systems, but that's in the past as well," Tolley said. 

The educational component was a recurring theme as each committee member voiced his and her opinion, not only the perceived funding issue. But Mayor Rick Merkt also wanted to make sure the municipalities still had control over how the money gets spent.

"If we get to the point where everyone agrees that this is something we need to move forward, that the public entities need to do the selecting of whoever is going to conduct the study itself so that we don't lose control over the process," Merkt said. "And we make sure that we qualify individual introduction to be reviewed."

Board attorney John Mills said he would draft the resolution as soon as possible so "the powers that be can decide when it gets posted" on the township's website. If all goes according to plan, there would be discussion at the April 8 meeting and action at the April 23 meeting.